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Last Spring, Arizona Highways Magazine approached photographer John Burcham and pitched a pretty unique idea. The magazine wanted John to return to a specific landscape many times over the course of one year to see what type of change would occur during that time. Eager to try something new, John agreed and began scouting for a proper location. After looking at a few different spots, he finally found Bismarck Lake, a small watering hole originally created as a drinking pond for cows, located about 20 miles from his home of Flagstaff, Arizona. He began photographing in June of 2013, slowly realizing how different this kind of work was for him.
I originally thought that I would be traveling to the exact same spot every time and photographing what I saw right there before me. But after discussing with my photo editor, we decided that it wasn’t necessary to shoot the same view each time. I realized that I had a lot more creative freedom by walking around the area and photographing all the aspects of the lake.
John would go to the lake two or three times a month and spend three to four hours photographing. For fear that photographing the same subject matter might become tedious, he continued to find new aspects of the lake each time he went. The change that he witnessed was beautiful and he found himself looking forward to his time at the lake.
The project consumed me in a way. I felt like I always needed to be there. When a storm would roll in, I would instantly think, ‘I should be up there to capture this.’
At the end of each month, John would send the photos he took from that month back to his editors and they would publish one in each of their monthly publications. Over the of 12 months, John had taken more than 1,700 pictures that wouldn’t make it to the magazine. He edited his favorites and they were posted on his website so that others could see his work.
The lake went through many changes in the months that I was there. In June, when I started, the lake had barely any water. Then, it was bone-dry and then it was filled to the brim. It was incredible to see the changes it would go through.
The year-long project came with some complications, mostly due to its location. The lake was located 20 miles from John, 19 of which was drivable. But John had to hike the last mile to the lake each time he visited, including trucking through the snow and rain with all of his gear and a ladder on his back. It was well worth it to John, however. He would get there before the sun rose and stay long after the sun went down. He even camped there a few times. And he was always alone. Out of the roughly 40 times that he visited the lake, only one time did a second person accompany him to the lake. He believes that it was due to the spontaneous nature of the project. John would just up and go when a certain kind of weather would hit.
Even though the project is now at an end, John would like to continue it.
I’d love to continue a project similar to this. It is nice to always have a project going on, even when you’re not working on something else. Even though I don’t normally make prints, I would like to have a gallery showing of some of my favorite shots from the project. It’d be great to get another job like that.
I have always noticed that I look back upon past shoots and wish that I had done something differently. But this project has taught me that change can be good, because every time I would go back to the lake to “recapture” a shot, everything would be beautifully different.
To see more of John’s work visit his site.